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President Barack Obama will talk about making college more affordable for middle-class families today when he visits Lackawanna College and in the process become only the second president to make two non-campaign visits to the region during a presidency.

Obama is expected to arrive in Scranton by bus in the mid-afternoon after a town hall meeting at Binghamton University. He is scheduled to speak in the gymnasium of the school's student union just before 5 p.m. about the new higher-education proposal he unveiled Thursday at the University of Buffalo. He'll be joined here by Vice President Joe Biden, who will return to the city of his youth on Air Force Two.

Air Force One, which arrived and parked at the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton International Airport on Thursday, will fly the president back to Washington, D.C., after his visit.

President George W. Bush was the first president to speak twice in the region while in office, visiting the University of Scranton in 2003 and Tobyhanna Army Depot in 2005. Obama's first official visit was November 2011 at Scranton High School.

This is the first time a president and vice president have made an official visit to the region together.

U.S. Sen. Bob Casey said Biden called him about two or three weeks ago with news that the president wanted to talk about higher education. He was looking for a location, preferably a community college, possibly a high school.

Casey told the vice president Lackawanna College was a natural and reminded him the school is the former Scranton Central High School.

"He knew exactly where it was," Casey said. "We're very happy they're both coming â¦ Obviously, having both of them is a great honor and a rare privilege for the region."

School President Mark Volk said White House officials first asked about using the college nine days ago and called back the next day to confirm the trip. Volk and other officials first met with a White House advance team on Saturday. The team chose the gymnasium because it's larger. The gym holds 4,300 people compared to 1,050 in the theater in the main building.

A White House official said he had no estimate for how many tickets were given away.

Since being tapped, the college has undergone a whirlwind of preparations, which happened to coincide with the already busy time of readying for a new school year. The school was supposed to have its open house/orientation today, but pushed that back to Monday, delaying the start of daytime classes a day.

Evening classes will begin as scheduled.

"It's been fun," said Volk, who said he was fielding "a bunch of calls" Thursday in an effort to nail down the details of the visit.

Considering the way the president has talked for years about the importance of two-year schools in the nation's higher-education system, being chosen for his visit is an honor, Volk said.

"There is no way we could have said no despite the work and everything else," he said.

In Buffalo, Obama argued colleges costs have increased 250 percent over the last 30 years while a typical family's income has risen only 16 percent. He laid out measures to corral costs including a system that rates colleges based on tuition, graduation rates, graduates' debt, percentage of low-income students and other factors.

By 2018, Obama hopes to have the ratings tied to the amount of financial aid a school receives to offer students.

"And we're going to keep fighting to make sure that this remains a country where, if you work hard and study hard and are responsible, you are rewarded, so that no matter what you look like and where you come from, what your last name is, here in America you can make it if you try," Obama said, according to a White House transcript.

When Obama arrives, he'll be greeted by at least one group trying to make a point.

The Gas Drilling Awareness Coalition said it expects several hundred protesters to picket against fracking, the controversial method of extracting gas from Marcellus Shale.

bkrawczeniuk@timesshamrock.com

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